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The Universe
● The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies and
all other forms of matter and Energy.
● Evolution of Universe : There are three main theories put forward to explain the origin and
evolution of the universe are:-
● The Big Bang Theory : In 1916 Einstein published his theory of general relativity with this he
also proposed a theoretical model of the universe which was not expanding.
● 1922 Russian cosmologist Alexander Friedman developed what are known as the Friedman
equations which were derived from Einstein equations for general relativity: contrary to
Einstein was advocating at the time with his cosmological constant.
Friedman work showed that the universe was likely in a state of expansion.
● 1924, Edwin Hubble's measurement of the great distance to the nearest spiral nebulae
showed that these systems were indeed other galaxies.
● 1927, Georges Lemaitre, a Belgian physicist and Roman catholic Priest independently derived
the same result as Friedman Equations and proposed that the inferred recession Galaxies was
due to the expansion of the Universe.
● 1929, Hubble discovered a correlation between distance and decussation velocity, which is
known as the Hubble law.
● 1931, Georges Lemaitre suggesting that the current expansion of the universe meant that the
father back in time one went, the smaller the universe wood be.
At some point in the past, he argued, the entire mass of the universe would have been
concentrated into a single point from which the very fabric of space and time originated.
● 1949, Fred Hoyle coined the phrase "Big Bang" for Lemaitre Hypothesis.
● 1965: The discovery and confirmation of the cosmic microwave background Radiation (M.B.R)
practically supported the Big Bang theory.
● 1981, Physicist Alan bath theorized of a period of rapid cosmic expansion that resolved other
theoretical problems.
● 1990, Discovery of rise of Dark energy resolves many issues of Big Bang theory.
● Some other experiments also supported the Big Bang theory.
(1) Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE)
(2) Hubble space Telescope
(3) Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP)
(4) Planck observatory
(5) Large Hedron collider experiment (LHC)
● According to Big Bang theory at starting the whole mass of the universe concentrated in an
extremely dense and hot fireball like structure 13.7 billion year ago it exploded (Big Bang).
The matter was broken into pieces, which were thrown out with high speed in all directions
forming stars and galaxies which are still moving away from one another.

Steady State Theory

● The steady state theory was developed during the 1940s by Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold
and sir Fred Hoyle.
● According to this theory, although the universe is expanding, it always remain balanced.
New matter are created to balance the decrease in density caused by the expansion of the
universe (New galaxies replacing old Galaxies)

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Pulsating Theory
● According to this theory universe follows expansion and contraction alternatively i.e.,
pulsating. It states that after the universe has contracted to a certain size, explosions will occur
and the universe will start expanding.
Note : Expansion of the universe may be topped by gravitational pull and they may contract again.

Important Points
1. Age of the universe is about 13.7 billion years.
2. Structure of the universe is mathematically referred as "Negative curvature" and "Saddle shape"
3. The farthest limit to our viewing is called the cosmic horizon. (13.7 billion light year away in every
direction)
4. Everything in the universe are four dimensional in nature.

GALAXIES
● A galaxy is a huge collection of gas, dust and billions of stars and their solar systems.
● A galaxy is held together by gravity.
Types : Galaxies are labeled according to their shape:
1. Irregular : It does not have any clear shape.These are new galaxies.
2. Spiral : They look like giant pinwheels in the sky. These are middle age
galaxies.
3. Elliptical : They look like flat balls. These are old age galaxies.
4. Star bust : In these new stars just seem to burst out very quickly.
5. Satellite Galaxy : These are less massive galaxies. These galaxies lacks a clean spiral shape because
the other galaxies are pulling and warping it. It is also known as dwarf Galaxies.

Points to remember
1. The word galaxy is derived from the Greek word galaxias which literally means milky.
2. Most galaxies are between 1,000 and 10,000 parsec in diameter.
(Parsec is an astronomical unit of length. To put the number into perspective one parsec is
equivalent to approximately 31 trillion kilometers OR 19 trillion miles.
3. There are more than two trillion galaxies in the observable universe.
4. More than 25 thousands of galaxies have been catalogued but only few have been given well
established name.
Eg : (1) C.R. – 7 : First galaxy formed after the Big Bang
2. Milky way : Name of our galaxy by Galileo. It is spiral. Our solar system situated in its middle
rotating arms which known as Airavath Path.
Andromeda : It is nearest galaxy to the milky way. It is spiral.

Nebula
● It is a Latin word which means mist or cloud. Nebulae are not only massive clouds of dust,
hydrogen and helium gas and plasma: they are also often Steller nurseries – i.e., the place
where stars are born.
A Nebula is formed when portion of the interstellar medium undergo gravitational collapse.
Mutual gravitational attraction causes matter to clump together, forming region of greater
density. Its ultraviolet ionizing radiation causes the surrounding gas to become visible at
optical wavelength.

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● Orion sward is nebulae of our galaxy. Nebula divided into four categories: (a) Diffuse Nebulae
(b) Dark Nebulae (c) supernova Remnant Nebulae (d) Planetary Nebulae
Quasars
● Quasi-stellar radio sources or Quasars was discovered in 1960 by Allan standage. Quasars
are among the brightest and most distant known celestial objects and crucial to
understanding the early universe. Quasars live only in galaxies with supermassive Black
holes.
Black Holes
These are infinitely dense points in space with deep gravity sinks so that not even light can escape the
powerful tug of its gravity. Therefore it is also known as cosmic vacuum cleaner.
● Anything that ventures too close will be stretched and compressed like putty in theoretical
process aptly known as spaghettification.
● There are four types of black Holes
1. Stellar
2. Intermediate
3. Supermassive
4. Miniature
Constellation

A constellation is a group of stars that forms definite imaginary outline or pattern on the celestial
sphere.

● 89 constellation known in our galaxy.

● Hydra is largest constellation according to the area and smallest constellation according to
number of stars (68 stars)
● Crux is smallest constellation according to area.
● Centaurus is largest constellation according to number of stars. (92 stars)
● Most popular constellation is ursa major which lies in the northern sky. In Latin it is also known
as the Great Bear or the larger Bear. In Indian mythology it is known as Saptrishi.

Pole star

In the northern hemisphere it is also known as north star. It is the brightest star that appears nearest
to either celestial at a particular time.

● At present the pole star is plaris (α ursa minoris)

● 2700 BCE Theban (α Draconis) is our pole star.
● 1400 CE Vega become our pole star.
● The present southern pole star is Polaris Australis (α octant is).

Stars

Stars are big exploding balls of gas mainly Hydrogen and helium; which secretes huge amount of
energy.

● Sun is nearest star of earth.

● Proxima Centauri is the nearest star of Sun
● Star colour is linked to temperature

1. Blue – 50,000 – 28,000 K : Resale

2. Blaise white – 28, 000 – 10,000 K : cerius
3. White – 10,000 – 75,00 K : Vega
4. Whitish Yellow – 7500 – 6000 K : Capella

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5. Yellow – 6000 – 4900 K : Sun

6. Orange – 4900 – 3500 K : Arcturus
7. Red – 3500 – 2000 K : Betel gees
Life cycles of stars

A stars life cycle is determined by its mass. The larger it mass, the shorter its life cycle.

● Molecular star : Stars start out as vast clouds of cold molecular gas. The gas cloud could be
floating n a galaxy for millions of years, but then some event causes it to begin collapsing
under its own gravity. For example when galaxies collide, regions of cold gas are given the kick
they need to start collapsing. As it collapses, the interstellar clouds breaks up into smaller and
smaller pieces, and each one of these collapses inward on itself. Each of these pieces will
become a star.
● Protostar : As the Steller material pulls tighter and tighter together, it heats up pushing again
further gravitational collapse. At this point the object is known as Proto star.
● T Tauri star : At tauri star begins when material stop falling into the
● protester and its releasing a tremendous amount of energy. The T Tauri phase lost for about
100 million years.
● Main sequence : It starts when the core temperature of a star will reach the point that fusion
its core can begin (Exothermic reaction).
● Red Gant : When a star exhausts its fuel of hydrogen at its core, its internal nuclear reactions
stop. Now star begins to contract inward through gravity.
This process heats up a shell of hydrogen around the core which then ignites in fusion and
causes the star to brighten up again. This causes the outer layers of star to expand outwards,
increasing the size of the star many times.
The temperature and pressure at the core of the star will eventually reach the point that
helium can be fused into carbon and known as red Giant/ dwarf.
White dwarf : The star will eject its outer layers into space and then contract down eventually
becoming a white dwarf.
Supernova : It is giant dying star of high mass that has come to the end of its life by spectacular
explosion.
Neutron star : It is the incredibly compact core that remains after a supernova explosion.

Solar system

● The solar system contains the sun, light planets with their satellites, dwarf planets, asteroids,
comets and other near earth objects.
● Origin of solar system : Many theories have been proposed to explain it:-
● Nebular Hypothesis : This theory was first proposed by Immanuel want in 1734.
● It was further developed by Sweden burgs in 1755.
● In 1796 Pierre Simon Laplace proposed similar model.
● According to this theory "he gaseous nebulae slowly rotates, gaseous nebulae slowly
rotates, gradually collapse and flattened due to gravity and eventually form stars and
planets.
● The planets have 99% of the angular momentum, and this fact could not be explained by
nebular model.

2. Planetesimal Theory : Thomas Chamberlin and forest moult an proposed in 1901.

3. Tidal planet Theory : This theory was given by Jeans in 1917.
4. Accretion model : This theory was given by Otto Schmidt in 1944.

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5. Proto Planet Theory : This theory was given by William McCrea in 1960.
6. Capture theory : This theory was given by Michael Wolfson in 1969.
7. Modern theory : It was given by Andrew prentice in 1978. According to this theory :-
a. A cloud of interstellar gas or dust (Solar nebula) is disturbed and collapses under its own gravity.
The disturbance could be, for example, the shock wave from a nearby supernova.
b. As the cloud collapses, it heats up and compresses in the centre. It heats enough for the dust
to vaporize. The initial collapse is supposed to take less that 100,000 years.
c. The centre compresses enough to become a protestar and the rest of the gas orbits or flows
around it. Most of that gas flows around it. Most of that gas flows inwards and adds to the mass
of the forming star but the gas is rotating. The centrifugal force from that prevents some of the
gas from reaching the forming star. Instead, it forms an accretion disk around the star.
The disk away its energy and cools off.
d. The gas orbiting protester may be unstable and start to compress under its own gravity. That
generally produces a double star.
e. If it doesn't the gas cools off enough for the metal, rock and ice to condense out into tiny
particles.
f. The dust particles collide with each other and form into larger particles. This goes on until the
particles get to the size of boulders or small asteroids.
g. Once the larger of these particles get big enough to have a nontrivial gravity, their growth
accelerates. Their gravity gives them an edge over smaller particles, and very quickly the large
objects have accumulated allof the solid matters close to their own orbit. How big they get
depends on their distance from the star and the density and composition of the protoplanetary
Nebula.
h. About one million years after the nebula cooled, the star would generate a very strong solar
wind, which would sweep away all of the gas left in the proto planetary nebula.
i. The planetesimals slowly collide with each other and become more massive.
j. Eventually after 10 to 100 million years it generates planets in stable orbits and that’s a solar
system.
The Sun

● Our sun is a normal main sequence G-2 yellow dwarf star, a hot ball of glowing gases, one of more
than 100 billion stars in our galaxy.
● Its gravity holds the solar system together, keeping everything from the biggest planets to the
smallest particles of debris in its orbit.
● Diameter – 13,90,000 km
Mass – 1.989e30 kg
Temperature – 5800 k (surface) 15,600,000 k (core)
● The sun is personified in many mythologies, the Greeks called it Helios and the Romans called it
sol.
● Sun contains more than 99.8% of the total mass in the solar system.
● The sun is primarily made up of hydrogen (H) (70%) helium (He) (28%) together with small amount
of carbon, oxygen, iron, neon and other elements.
● The outer layers of the sun exhibit differential rotation → At the equator the surface rotates once
every 25.4 days – and near the pole it is as much as 36 days. This odd behaviour is due to its gaseous
structure.

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● Core of the sun covers approximately the inner 25% of its radius. At the centre of the core the sun
density is more than 150 times that of the water.
● The sun's power is produced by nuclear fusion reaction. Each second more than 70 million tons
hydrogen undergo this process and produce energy in the form of Gamma Radiations.
● The surface of the sun called photosphere (5800 k).
● Sun spots are cool regions (3800 k)
● A small region known as the chromosphere lies above the photosphere
● The highly rarefied region above the chromosphere called the corona, visible during a total solar
eclipse.
● The outermost part of the sun is known as corono sphere.
● The sun’s magnetosphere/Heliosphere (magnetic field area) extends well beyond Pluto.
● Sun also emits low density streams of charged particles like electron, protons etc known as solar
wind which propagates throughout the solar system. During the solar minimum of the solar cycle
the solar wind emanating from the polar regions flows at nearly double the rate. During the solar
maximum the solar wind moves at an intermediate speed.
● The age of the sun is 6.5 billion years.
Planets
● According to the International Astronomical Union Summit 2006; a planet is a celestial body that–
(1) Is in orbit around any star
(2) Having area at least 3000 km2
(3) Got their energy and light from that star.
(4) Has sufficient mass for itself gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a
hydrostatic equilibrium shape (Nearly round)
(5) Has cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit
● In our solar system total number of planets are 8; which is divided into two categories:–
(1) Terrestrial or Inner planet – They found inside asteroids belts. They are 4 in number Mercury,
Venus, Earth, Mars.
(2) Gas Giant or Outer Planet – They are 4 in number Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.
● Planets which orbit other stars (not the sun) are called exoplanets.
1. Mercury
● The closest planet to the Sun and a very hot planet.
● Smallest planet in the solar system with a diameter of 4900 Km.
● Fastest Planet with speed of 172500 Km per hour to complete revolution around the Sun in
88 days.
● The planet with no water and gases like Nitrogen, Hydrogen, Oxygen and Carbon Dioxide.
2. Venus
● Hottest planet in the solar system with the surface temperature of 478 degree Celsius.
● Also known as “Earth’s Twin”. It is because of similarity in size and mass between Venus and
Earth.
● One of the two planets in the solar system which rotate around the axis in a Clockwise
direction.
● Brightest Star in the Solar system. It can be seen in the morning and evening with open eyes.
So known as “Evening Star” and “Morning Star”.
3. Earth
● The only Planet to give support to life with a pleasant atmosphere.
● Also known as “Blue Planet” because of the presence of water on it.
● It has one natural satellite named “Moon”.

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4. Mars
● Known as “Red Planet” because of Iron-rich red soil.
● Second smallest planet in the solar system after Mercury.
● Has two natural moons “Phobos” and “Deimos”.
● Has a thin atmosphere and surface with valleys, craters, deserts and ice caps etc.
● “Olympus Mons” – Largest volcano and the tallest mountain in solar system lies on Mars.
5. Jupiter
● Largest planet of the solar system with the shortest rotation
● Has atmosphere filled with Hydrogen, Helium and other gases
● The third brightest object in the night sky after the Moon and Venus.
● Great Red Spot, a giant storm in the solar system exists on this planet.
● Has at least 69 moons, including 4 large Galilean Moons “Io, Europa, Ganymede, and
Callisto” which were discovered by Galileo. “Ganymede” is the largest among them.
● It has an unclear ring around it.
6. Saturn
● Second largest planet in the solar system and a gas giant.
● Has bright and concentric rings around it which are made up of tiny rocks and pieces of Ice.
● Saturn can float on water because it has less density than water.
● Has at least 62 moons and Titan is the largest among them.
7. Uranus
● Has the third- largest planetary radius and fourth largest planetary mass in the Solar
system.
● Greenish in colour.
● Discovered by William Herschel in 1781.
● Known as “Ice Giant”. The atmosphere of Uranus is composed of Hydrogen and Helium
primarily, but it also contains more water, ammonia etc.
● Has coldest planetary atmosphere in the solar system.
● Rotates clockwise on its axis like Venus but unlike other planets
● Has at least 25 moons. Famous moons- Miranda, Ariel and Umbriel
8. Neptune
● Farthest planet from the Sun.
● It is also “Ice Giant”. Atmosphere primarily composed of Hydrogen and Helium.
● Bluish in colour because of Methane.
● The fourth largest planet and the third most- massive planet in the solar system
● Discovered by Johann Galle and Urbain Le Verrier in 1846. The only planetin the solar
system found by Mathematical Predictions.
● Has known 14 satellites. Famous moon – Triton
Other
Pluto
● As per the new definition of Planets determined by the International Astronomical Union
(IAU), Pluto has been omitted from the list of planets in 2006.
● Pluto is considered as a dwarf planet (size between planets and asteroids) now and it is a
member of the Kuiper Belt.
Kuiper Belt
● It is a spherical boundary outside the orbit of Neptune containing a number of asteroids,
rocks, and comets.
Goldilocks Zone
● It refers to the habitable zone around a star where the temperature is just right - not too hot
and not too cold - for liquid water to exist on a planet.
Other Space Objects
1. Asteroids
● These are small objects; rocks (mostly debris) revolve around the Sun.

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● They are mostly found in the Asteroid Belt which lies between the orbits of Mars and
Jupiter.
● These are also known as Minor planets.
● Ceres, Vesta, Psyche are some famous and largest asteroids in the solar system.
2. Meteors and Meteorites
● These are also known as Shooting stars.
● Meteors are the small-sized rocky material which is generally formed due to asteroid
collision and approaching the earth.
● Because of Earth’s atmospheric layers, these small rocks burn before reaching the surface.
● But there are some meteors which do not burn completely and land on Earth’s surface. They
are called as Meteorites.
● Willamette, Mbozi, Cape York, and El Chaco are some meteorites found on the Earth.
● Lonar lake, Maharashtra in India is supposed to be created by a meteor impact
in Pleistocene Epoch.
3. Comets
● These are shiny, luminous “Tailed Stars”. These are rocky and metallic materials surrounded
by frozen gases.
● These are generally found in the Kuiper Belt. They travel towards the Sun.
● Their tail faces opposite of the sun and head faces towards the Sun.
● They become visible when they travel close to the Sun.
● Halley's Comet is famous which appeared last time in 1986 and which reappears after every
76 years.
Tricks to Learn planets Planets in order from the sun
My Very Efficient Mother Just Served Us Nuts
Inner Planets (Terrestrial planets)
1. M- Mercury
2. V- Venus
3. E- Earth
4. M- Mars
Outer Planets (Jovian planets)
5. J- Jupiter
6. S- Saturn
7. U- Uranus
8. N- Neptune
Tricks to learn planets in order of size
Just Sit Up Now Each Monday Morning
1. J- Jupiter
2. S- Saturn
3. U- Uranus
4. N- Neptune
5. E- Earth
6. V- Venus
7. M- Mars
8. M- Mercury

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